Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry

Natan Sharansky, his wife Avital and his 79-year-old mother Ida Milgrom stood in a cage in front of the Soviet Mission to the United Nations here Thursday, calling for freedom for Soviet Jewish dissident Iosif Begun and demanding free emigration for all Soviet Jews who want to leave. Sharansky and his family arrived at the… More ▸

Relatives of Iosif Begun in Moscow still had no word on his rumored release when contacted Monday afternoon, the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry reported Monday. Chaim and Zelda Tepper, cousins of Begun’s in New York, who spoke with Begun’s wife Inna in Moscow Monday, said they received the following message from Inna: “Bad news… More ▸

About 50 Soviet secret police forcefully broke up a demonstration in Moscow Thursday for the release of Dr. Iosif Begun and detained seven of the demonstrators, including Begun’s wife Inna, the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry reported here. Members of the foreign press were shoved and kicked according to eyewitness reports, SSSJ said. Thursday’s demonstration… More ▸

Inna Meiman of Moscow, who was allowed to go abroad last month for treatment of a tumor on her neck, died Monday in the Lombardi Cancer Research Center of Georgetown University Hospital. She was 54 years old. She had refused to leave the Soviet Union earlier because her husband, Naum, a refusenik since 1975, was… More ▸

Prisoner of Conscience Zachar Zunshain is scheduled to be released from a Siberian labor camp, six weeks before his three-year term for “anti-Soviet slander” is completed, and allowed to leave for Israel three days later, according to the Union of Councils of Soviet Jews and the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry (SSSJ). Zunshain’s wife, Tatyana,… More ▸

Three leading Jewish organizations are planning events here in January and February 1987 to alert public opinion to the continuing plight of Jews in the Soviet Union, the duplicity of the Kremlin on that issue and to let Jews in the USSR know they are not forgotten. On January 23, the Union of Councils for… More ▸

International Human Rights Day was marked here Wednesday by protests against continued Soviet persecution of dissidents and the continuing difficulties refuseniks face in trying to obtain exit visas. The temperature of the protests was raised by reports that one of the best known Soviet political dissidents, Anatoly Marchenko, had died in the notorious Chistopol prison… More ▸

The Soviet Union’s codification of emigration procedures this month was criticized as a “smokescreen” by some Soviet Jewry movement leaders contacted by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. Others, however, saw some positive development in the new regulations. The regulations, to take effect January 1, define acceptable conditions for emigration and temporary travel, differing significantly from the… More ▸

Leningrad activist Albert (Chaim) Burstein was arrested Monday as he spoke by phone from a local post office to Long Island Committee for Soviet Jewry director Lynn Singer. He was sentenced to 15 days in jail for “resisting arrest,” the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry reported. According to the SSSJ, Burstein, 21, is one of… More ▸

Charges have been dropped by New York City Criminal Court Justice Roger Hayes against all 55 rabbis and laypersons who were arrested October 12 at the Soviet UN Mission here. Their demonstration coincided with the Reagan-Gorbachev Iceland summit meeting and Yom Kippur eve. The protesters, who had been charged with disorderly conduct, were organized by… More ▸